Leaders

Barack Obama and George Bush have at least one thing in common when it comes to the second terms they won — the first year of their encores have been downers when it came to their public images.

President Obama continues to have sky-high job ratings among liberal Democrats — 90% approve and just 8% disapprove in Pew Research’s poll earlier this month. Their approval of his job performance is twice the rating given by the public as a whole (which rose slightly to 45% after steadily declining over six months). But many […]

Survey Report For the first time since last spring, Barack Obama’s steadily declining job rating has shown a modest improvement. And while his signature legislative accomplishment – the 2010 health care law – remains unpopular, Obama engenders much more public confidence on health care policy than do Republican leaders in Congress. The flawed rollout of […]

The issue of income inequality is back in the news at a time when the U.S. public believes there is a growing gulf between rich and poor that is likely to continue.

Partisanship is a major factor in a new Pew Research Center survey showing that a growing number of Americans believe the U.S. is less respected in the world and plays a less important role globally than 10 years ago.

A new survey by Harvard University’s Institute of Politics finds that 18-to-29 year olds now have a more negative view of his presidency. But the declines are not greater than those of other age groups.

Pew Research has tracked vote preference among different age cohorts in the past several presidential and midterm elections and looked at who was president when each cohort turned 18. By looking at likely voters from our pre-election surveys, we can see how each age cohort voted relative to the national average.

A new report from the World Economic Forum ranks the 10 most important global trends, based on a poll of 1,592 leaders from academia, business, government, and non-profits. Here are some data points that compare and contrast the public’s views around the world with the trends identified by the experts. 1. Rising societal tensions in the Middle […]

Forget Romeo and Juliet or Cleopatra and Marc Antony. At least when it comes to politics, one of the great love affairs of all time may have been between Lyndon Johnson and… himself.